Not to Kei
by DragonBlood-Katana
Summary: Written for Tsukkihina Week 2016 Day 3. Prompt: Songs. Shouyou is a lot of things, but irrelevant is not one of them. At least, not to Kei.


"Hey, Kei – aha, that rhymes!" Shouyou grinned, bouncing up to Kei with a bright grin.

Kei rolled his eyes, reluctantly looping his headphones around his neck. Tadashi snickered quietly, then moved away at the glare Kei sent him. "What do you want, shrimp?"

To anyone else, it looked like a normal exchange. It wasn't, though. Not to Kei. If he was honest with himself, no interaction with Shouyou had ever been 'normal,' really. Not to Kei. Although he had only just realized it, thanks to Tadashi's never-ending teasing, Kei had had a crush – he would deny it to everyone in a heartbeat – on Shouyou, Karasuno's resident ball of condensed sunshine.

Kei knew it was impossible. Shouyou was everything Kei wasn't, everything Kei wanted to be but couldn't bring himself to really, truly strive for. Shouyou was bright and excitable and loveable and friendly. Shouyou was an open book and he didn't give a damn. Kei was cold and rude and oft-labeled as downright cruel. Kei was a book that no one bothered to look at, much less open and try to understand. Every time Kei heard someone referred to Shouyou as 'normal,' Kei cringed internally. Shouyou was not normal. Not to Kei.

To Kei, Shouyou was a reason to get out of bed every day. To Kei, Shouyou was the brightest thing that he had ever seen. To Kei, Shouyou was the one thing deserving of prayer; not some silly deity who never showed his face. To Kei, Shouyou was everything anyone would ever need. Fuck food and water and oxygen. As long as Shouyou was around, Kei felt like those were all secondary priorities. As mercilessly as Tadashi teased him for it, Kei was happy to admit in private that Shouyou was perfect. Anyone who said otherwise was wrong and needed to be slapped. Shouyou would never be anything short of flawless, despite his whining and clinging and his overinflated ego. Not to Kei.

Shouyou shifted his weight slowly from one foot to the other and then back again, grinning sheepishly. "I, ah… I kinda forgot."

Kei scoffed and turned away, moving to put his headphones over his ears again. "Then go away. You're annoying."

It couldn't have been further from the truth but Kei didn't want to give himself away. That rejection was one that he knew he would not be able to take and therefore did not want to take a chance on. Kei was a coward and he knew it, but he was fine with it. At least cowardice was safe; if he got too close to the sun – to Shouyou – he'd be burnt to a crisp. Being burnt to death wasn't the way Kei wanted to go; it had always sounded much too painful for his tastes. As always, he was a coward to the end.

"Wait, wait, wait! I remembered!" Shouyou grabbed onto Kei's arm and Kei tried not to jump.

With a sigh, Kei turned back to Shouyou and sighed. "Fine, then. What is it?"

"Yamaguchi said he wanted to sit up with the Coach today so he said I should sit next to you!"

Kei clenched his jaw. _Damn it, Tadashi. I'm going to kill you._

"Fine, then. Just don't bother me." Kei turned away again, boarding the bus and heading to his usual seat toward the back. Shouyou followed; Kei didn't have to turn and look to know that he was smiling as usual. That smile would be the death of Kei.

As Kei passed, Tadashi, who had taken Shouyou's normal seat beside Tobio, flashed him a cheeky smile. Kei glared and Tadashi turned away again, hiding a snicker behind his hand. Kei resisted the urge to smack him upside the head, choosing instead to sit down. Shouyou crawled over him and squashed himself between the window and Kei, still grinning like an idiot; his elbows and knees dug into Kei as he did.

"Ow! What the hell?" Kei yelped, rubbing the spot on his side that had suffered a particularly violent jab from Shouyou's elbow.

"Sorry!" Shouyou didn't look sorry, but Kei's anger melted at the sight of Shouyou's bright grin.

"Whatever. Be more careful next time, shrimp." Kei turned away, slipping his headphones back over his ears.

Shouyou turned to look out the window as the bus started. For a good twenty minutes, Kei was left in relative peace to try to calm his overreacting heart, but when he looked over and saw Shouyou looking a little green.

"Don't puke on me," Kei grumbled, and Shouyou turned to him with a pout.

"I—" Shouyou started, then clapped a hand to his mouth. Kei leaned away a little; he knew that Shouyou got sick with nerves before matches but the last thing he wanted was to be vomited on.

"Jesus, don't talk if you're going to vomit." Shouyou nodded, looking queasy.

Kei had no idea how to calm people down. The only way he knew to calm down was with music.

 _Duh._ Kei slipped his headphones off his head and settled them over Shouyou's ears. Shouyou gave Kei a confused glance but settled back into the seat, closing his eyes and starting to bob his head to the music. Kei watched as the greenish tinge faded from Shouyou's cheeks, glad that he had been able to do something, at the very least. Within minutes, Shouyou was asleep, his head resting against Kei's shoulder. Kei ignored the way the headphones were digging into his shoulder and just enjoyed Shouyou's closeness, secretly giddy at how at ease Shouyou was around him. That sort of mindless trust would have been absolutely meaningless to most people but not to Kei. Not to Kei, who had only ever had Tadashi fall asleep around him.

The sweetness of the moment, lost on everyone but Kei, only lasted until Kei realized that the last thing he had been listening to was the playlist he put together to help him cope when he was pining especially hard. Kei could feel his face burning; Tadashi's snickers from a few rows in front of him indicated that the blush was very much visible. Kei felt like he could have melted into the ground out of pure embarrassment. Of course, Shouyou wouldn't be able to figure it out, but that was just another tiny detail that most would miss and consider unimportant. Then again, most people would consider Shouyou relatively unimportant.

Shouyou wasn't unimportant, not at all. Not to Kei.


End file.
